


permanent marker

by space_dev



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Abuse, Angst, Child Abuse, Cutting, Depression, Hurt No Comfort, Past Abuse, Self Harm, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 14:25:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16327700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/space_dev/pseuds/space_dev
Summary: Jeremy first truly hated himself at age eleven.His mom hated him.He was everything his mom said he was and more.And his mom never lied, so it all was true.





	permanent marker

**Author's Note:**

> HUGE TW for physical and emotional child abuse, abuse in general, self-harm, depression, and suicide.

"Was _he ever okay?"_

That was what people were asking as they stood around a closed casket. Inside, though they couldn't see,  _he_ was in there. The remnants of a person who was seemingly always broken.

Maybe it had just been bad luck.

Maybe he was just born at a bad time.

In the wrong place.

Maybe he was just an anomaly. 

Maybe he was never really meant to be here, anyway.

Maybe being born to Anne Madison Fletcher-Heere was the first mistake the world made with him.

It all came back to her.

Anne used to be someone else. 

Warm.

               Cheerful.

                           

                                 Happy.

 

                                               Kind.

 

But something happened between her marrying Benjamin Paul Heere and Jeremiah Nikolas Heere's birth. The light went out. There were whispers of a miscarriage, low mumblings of her father's sudden and massive heart attack that ended his life. Whatever the reason, she was never the same. 

People thought that maybe, Jeremy would strike a match to light her candle once more. But if anything, it only created a thunderstorm so strong that the wick would constantly be wet and no match would ever light it. Jeremy _was_ a spark, though. A ball of sunshine, a ball of joy, smiling as soon as his baby facial muscles could. If the spark had been cared for enough, maybe he would've become a bright, beautifully burning fire. 

But anne stomped on that spark every day.

Now that she was in prison and no longer talking to anyone from her past, nobody quite knew exactly when the stomping, the hitting had begun. as soon as she knew that her hands wouldn't kill him, they say, is when she started with the bruises.

Jeremy grew up with a hit nearly every day. He was used to it. He thought he served no purpose other than his mother's tackling dummy. He was useless, he was stupid, he was worthless, he was a waste, he was a disappointment, that's what Anne told him, so that's what he thought he was. If mommy said it, it was true. Everything mommy said was true. 

But Anne couldn't control fate, and she couldn't control fate ushering in what might have been the only good thing in his life. 

Michael George Mell entered her son's life on August 7th, 2004. First day of kindergarten. 

Michael was full of energy that Jeremy didn't have anymore. He was the sunshine Jeremy used to be. He was happy, like Anne once was. Anne would look at him coldly and remember bitterly when she was like that.

 _If not for Benjamin and Jeremy,_ she might think, _I might still be like that_. And then she would go and remind Jeremy how he ruined her life.

Michael introduced things to Jeremy that he never would've dreamed of. Pokemon. Neopets. Legos. Barbie dolls.

Anne didn't like it when Jeremy played Pokemon or Neopets, she'd complain that he left the cards everywhere. Anne didn't like it when Jeremy played with Legos, she'd complain that she stepped on a stray red brick when he was building his spaceship farm. Anne didn't like it when Jeremy played with Barbie dolls, she'd complain that they were girl toys, and that Michael must be gay if he liked them. 

Later, when older Jeremy told older Michael about when she said that, he'd laugh and say that she was right, he was gay. But young Jeremy, he figured out that his mommy didn't like gay, and so gay must be bad.

Some say that if Jeremy hadn't trusted, hadn't listened to Anne, maybe he'd be okay. But Anne was his mother. You can't exactly not trust your mother, especially at such a young age.

Jeremy decided that pain must be a good thing. If his mommy kept on hitting him, maybe that meant that pain was a good thing. He wasn't sure if he liked it, though, or if he was right. His mommy was always angry when he hit him.

Jeremy first truly hated himself at age eleven. His mom hated him. He was everything his mom said he was and more. And his mom never lied, so it all was true. So he stole her pink Lady Venus razor. Put on his winter boots and stomped on the plastic around the blades till it broke and the blades clattered to the floor. He replaced the razor with a new one and wrote how he felt about himself in permanent marker on his arm. Permanent scars. They'd eventually fade, but they'd always be there. 

Reminding him.

When Jeremy was fifteen, Benjamin woke up, if briefly. He found out just how bruised, how skinny, how scarred his son was, inside and out. And he was scared. But he pushed it away and went to the person who made him like this.

"It's my fault I'm like this. I'm so stupid, so useless, so worthless, such a disappointment. I ruined mom's life, dad. I deserve this," Jeremy said.

Benjamin and Anne yelled all night, and when he went to work, Anne took out her fury on Jeremy. 

"You like cuts? You like pain? Good. Because that's what you're getting," she said.

By noon, he had thirteen more scars, all from a shard of a shattered heart. Yellow Fiestaware.

Bright.

You'd expect a family with such pretty and cheerful plates to be happy.

This family was not.

When Benjamin came home, saw Jeremy sweeping up broken glass by himself, so broken he might as well be in the dustpan himself, he picked him up, he cleaned him up, he took him to Michael's house. Hushed voices talking in the foyer while he was in the living room with michael. Michael's mom calling the cops. Michael, asking what was wrong. What happened. 

He didn't really want to play Pokemon that day.

His mom was arrested, and he had to testify. It was unexplainably scary. He cried and had a panic attack on the stand. He was conditioned from birth not to talk about this stuff.

But his words were enough to get his mom sentenced. Life.

His dad felt horrible for not seeing it before, and that horrible feeling turned into hate. Not for Jeremy. For himself.

When he stopped wearing pants, he only made it worse for Jeremy.

High school came. Jeremy, the broken boy who had special permission to wear long sleeved shirts and long pants during gym, was an easy target for bullies. 

One time, they held him down while they pushed up his sleeves and pant legs and laughed at his past scribbled in permanent marker, then beat him up. If he wasn't closed off before, he was now.

The bullying was so bad that when Richard Kenneth Goranski told him about the SQUIPs, he bought one. What little Bar Mitzvah money his mom hadn't spent on herself, he scraped together and kissed goodbye at a Payless.

The SQUIP was as bad as his mom. If not worse.

So you'd imagine, when he finally got it out, _he_ was worse.

You'd be right.

The friends he gained did help, but it only slowed the eventual. When eventually, it was too bad, he pulled out his trusty permanent marker and spelled out his mistakes one more time. 

And this time, it was fatal.

 

 


End file.
